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Review:

Beeezie says:Hey, I'm here for our swap! Sorry it's taken me some time - end of semester crush. :( But on the bright side, I'm done!

I wasn't sure whether I wanted to continue with CoB (which I haven't finished yet - I need to put it on my ereader or something and polish it off on my way to and from school/work) or start with Marked, but in the end, curiosity about Draco's character and how you'd choose to portray him won out.

Thus far, at least, I think you managed to capture his voice perfectly. There's just the right amount of privileged derision - e.g., planning to speak to his father about making sure that he gets credit for whatever Umbridge found, or telling Tracey Davis to write Pansy's essay for her, or deciding that he'd just keep Pansy as a mistress because the wife his parents chose for him wouldn't be as fun.

There's also a slightly slimy "nothing can touch me" vibe that's perfect for Draco as we knew him in the books. He reads about his father infiltrating the Ministry, and it doesn't even occur to him to worry. He just assumes that there will be a reason to celebrate. In some ways, it almost feels childlike and innocent - nobody who's actually experienced life expects it to turn out okay all the time.

It's a bit of a stark contrast to Harry, who throughout all the books often seemed to jump to the worst case scenario. I think that Draco as you've portrayed him here - which does seem very consistent with the books - is probably more naive than Harry was in the first book, which makes his comments about Hermione's blood status or his father's possible mistresses come off almost a bit silly to me, because I don't think that he really properly understands what a lot of it means.

One of the things that struck me the most, honestly, was the way Draco made sure to talk to Daphne about the letter. It's so self-important - "obviously everyone's paying attention to me and cares" and unnecessarily sneaky. He just thought he was being clever.

Which, as I said, is perfect. That was always how Draco came across to me in the books, too, and I think you've done a great job with him so far here. :) (Sorry for the lack of CC - I tried, but there's nothing in here that I really wanted to critique!)

Author's Response: Hey, there!

First off, apologies for the embarrassing lateness of this response. Busy, busy, busy...

I'm glad you liked Draco's characterization and thought processes. I went back and tried to brush up on the way he's written in GoF and OotP, which turns out to be challenging because he has a lot less dialog in those books than you'd think. But the overarching themes were definitely his arrogance, sense of entitlement and self-importance. He believes very firmly that his family's influence and money will protect them from any sort of repercussions, no matter what kind of nasty business his father gets into. All of that is about to change in a major way, though.

At this point in his life, Draco is still definitely the Anti-Harry. That will change to an extent over the next two years, and I wanted to capture the beginnings of that process.